


The Boy is Beautiful

by flaming_muse



Category: Glee
Genre: Future Fic, M/M, Museums
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-09
Updated: 2013-04-09
Packaged: 2017-12-08 01:01:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,990
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/755149
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flaming_muse/pseuds/flaming_muse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kurt and Blaine spend a rainy day strolling through the Metropolitan Museum of Art. College-era futurefic.</p>
<p>general spoilers for season 4 thus far assumed but not really mentioned - to be safe, I’ll say through all aired episodes, meaning 4x17 (“Guilty Pleasures”) - with no spoilers beyond</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Boy is Beautiful

**Author's Note:**

> Blaine’s understanding of homosexual relationships in ancient Greece is flawed and incomplete at best, but it didn’t seem right to me that he’d know all that much about it. So don’t use this story to write a paper or anything. It’s a lot more complicated than what I talk about here. The erotic kylixes and their inscriptions, however, do exist in significant quantities and can be found in varied concentrations in museum collections through the US and Europe. :) A (non-erotic) kylix from the Met’s collection can be seen at http://www.metmuseum.org/collections/search-the-collections/130007807

Blaine would have thought that a rainy grey day in the middle of the winter would have meant that the Met was packed with weather-weary New Yorkers trying to find some sort of relief from the depressing, monochromatic drizzle outside in the well-lit, climate-controlled rooms full of breathtaking art inside - and indeed the Egyptian galleries were as thick as ever with chattering school groups filling the rooms from one wall to another - but in the quiet galleries away from the most popular art it was surprisingly serene. The voices of the few strolling visitors were hushed, the guards were half-asleep at their posts, and the sheets of rain falling against the occasional window were a soft cocoon of noise around the peaceful space.

Away from the crowds, it was like it was their own personal museum to explore, and Kurt and Blaine - disinclined to go back out into the bitter rain to get home - had been wandering for hours.

“Every time I come here I find something new and incredible,” Kurt in a happy sort of daze. His fingers caught lightly in Blaine’s, Kurt guided them around a massive stone urn displayed on a low platform, his eyes sweeping over it with interest.

“I know,” Blaine replied, feeling fond and satisfied and maybe a little over-saturated by having seen so very many pieces of art all in one visit. But that was okay, because he was with Kurt, and he’d happily just look at Kurt if the art got to be too much of a blur. “I remember last month when we turned a corner and you nearly swooned over that Versace dress in the Costume Institute.”

“I didn’t _swoon_ ,” Kurt told him. His chin lifting, he tore his gaze away from the urn and focused on Blaine. “I had a very respectful and emotional response to a piece of exquisite couture, thank you.”

“A response that almost ended up with you on the floor until I got my arm around your waist.”

Kurt’s haughty look turned a bit smug. “Maybe that was my plan. You’d been talking about that broadsword for a full half hour by that point. I needed to do something dramatic to get your attention back.”

“You _saw_ the intricacy of craftsmanship of the decoration on the hilt - “ Blaine began before he realized that he was proving Kurt’s point about how caught up in it he had been, but it really was beautiful, and it reminded him of something out of the fantasy novels he used to read in middle school. His fingers had ached to touch the etched designs and heft the weapon in his hand, swing the full, deadly weight of it...

“You have that _Lord of the Rings_ look in your eyes again,” Kurt said and opened the glass door to the next gallery with his free hand.

Blaine walked through the doorway into a small, white-walled room lined with cases of black and red pottery, Kurt trailing along behind him with their fingers still linked. “Maybe, but I’m not buying that story about you faking the swoon. You were shaking. You are an excellent performer, but you couldn’t fake that.”

“You don’t think so?”

Blaine shrugged in apology.

Kurt pulled his hand free, obviously offended, though not hugely so, which gave support to Blaine’s theory about the swooning being real. It had been an amazing dress, after all. “Enjoy reading the boring explanatory label on your own. I’ll be looking at what’s actually important: the art.”

“You know I like to read about the background of the pieces first,” Blaine protested, watching Kurt stalk toward one of the cases.

Kurt waved an airy hand in reply, and Blaine sighed over the well-trod argument, admired for a moment the line of Kurt’s long legs in those perfectly cut jeans of his, and then turned back to the wall to learn about the exhibition.

_Expressions of Love: Sexuality and Eroticism in Ancient Greece. This temporary exhibition drawn from the museum’s own collection displays a number of items given by admirers to the objects of their affection or commemorating the same. While the archaeological record illustrates that the names of certain individuals - often athletes - were inscribed in numbers that preclude the idea that they indicate a sexual relationship with each donor or cup-owner, we can assume that quite a few of these drinking cups (kylixes) were presented directly from one lover to another or were used during dinners where a sexual relationship was hoping to be kindled over these cups when filled with water-mixed wine. The explicitly and erotically sexual nature of many of the designs -_

“Um,” Kurt said, and Blaine turned sharply, his own heart pounding in surprise at the topic of the art, to find him staring at a round, flat cup displayed behind glass. His cheeks were flushing a fetching pink. “Well, there goes the idea that the Greeks were stuffily sitting around talking about philosophy all day.”

Blaine decided for once that reading the explanatory material could wait, and he joined Kurt at the case. The bottom of the bowl of the cup he was looking at showed a bearded man, dressed in some sort of robes, offering a naked younger man a chicken. Blaine peered at it a bit more closely. Nope, the picture didn’t change. “Is that a _chicken_?”

“Mmm.” His voice sounding a little strangled, Kurt gestured to the next kylix. “On that one there’s a naked man _riding_ a giant chicken.”

“Riding a - I’d say the meaning was pretty obvious, but, um, the word can’t possibly translate, right?” Blaine said. He didn’t know why he felt suddenly flustered; this was fine art, after all, not porn he’d accidentally left open on his computer when Santana came over, and it wasn’t like he had kind of personal objection to the, well, riding of cocks. That would be pretty hypocritical, after all. Still, what he and Kurt did in the privacy of their apartment was very different from being faced with it unexpectedly in the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Blaine couldn’t help but look at the kylix in question, and Kurt was right. There was a painted picture of a naked man riding a huge, white chicken. “And it’s also not a rooster.”

“The label says chickens were a traditional gift to woo a lover in ancient Greece,” Kurt said.

“Oh.” Blaine tried to imagine what it would have been like to show up at Kurt’s front door in high school with a chicken in a cage. No matter how Kurt had felt about Pavarotti, Blaine was certain there would have been squawking in objection, and it wouldn’t have been from the bird. Burt might have had some words to say about it, too. He leaned toward the label in the case, then stood back upright. “Wait a minute. You read the label!”

Kurt raised his chin again. “I never said I didn’t read the labels. I just said I prefer to look at the art _first_.” His voice dropped. “Although I’m rethinking my preferences, because it might have been nice to have had some warning this time.”

Blaine looked at the cup. Apart from there being two men together in a domestic scene, one of them sitting there without clothes, it wasn’t like there was anything particularly titillating about the design, but then it was in the middle of the case. It wasn’t where Kurt had started. When he glanced over and saw a man with an enormous erection bending a woman over a table on another cup, he was no longer surprised about Kurt’s reaction.

“They’re not subtle,” Blaine agreed. He rubbed at the back of his neck and wondered if they were having problems with the heat in the gallery. He felt a little warmer than he had out in the hallway.

“I can imagine Puck buying that one in bulk for all of the cheerleaders and sorority girls he’s tried to sleep with over the years,” Kurt said dryly, following Blaine’s gaze.

Blaine laughed - and maybe it was a little breathlessly, but this was _art_ , damn it, and he was supposed to be a mature college student who could enjoy it without being shocked - and walked a little further down the case to a cup with two men reclining on some sort of bed or couch. They looked happy, relaxed, and were drinking out of wine cups of the exact type of the object they were painted on.

“ _Ho pais kalos_ ,” Kurt murmured, drawn back to his side.

“What?” Blaine asked.

“ _Ho pais kalos_. It’s written right there.” Kurt pointed to some small letters scrawled next to the younger man in the design. “It means ‘the boy is beautiful’. Or handsome, I guess.”

Blaine looked at the little scribbled letters arcing haphazardly across the background of the picture. “You can read Greek?”

“You know I have a fascination with fraternities,” Kurt said with a tilt of his head, “but no. I can sound out the letters, but your precious wall label provided the translation. Some of them refer to the women instead.”

“But that one says ‘the boy is beautiful’?”

Kurt nodded. The flush in his cheeks was lessening, and the light in his eyes was going from embarrassed to interested. “Not the one in the scene, but the younger man the older one was giving the cup to. Hmm. It’s certainly better than a lot of come-ons I’ve heard.”

Blaine was distracted for a moment by the thought of a man two thousand years ago having a cup inscribed for someone he was attracted to, maybe even loved, like so many gifts he’d given Kurt.

It was like a light switch flipped in his brain, and the cup turned from a piece of art to something far more personal. Some long-dead Greek man had been in love, and this had been his gift. It made him seem so much more real. It made Blaine feel like he understood him and maybe would be understood in return. Love was something that drew people together, and it had been happening for millennia. Between men, too, between men like Kurt and him, maybe.

Then Kurt’s words caught up with him. “Wait, you’ve heard a lot of come-ons?” he asked.

Kurt reached out and took Blaine’s hand in his, rolling his eyes in a way that was actually reassuring. “It doesn’t matter. You only need to worry about them if for some reason you decide to give me a chicken.”

Blaine had to smile and squeezed his fingers. “Why would I give you a chicken? Haven’t I already wooed you and caught you?”

“Blaine Anderson,” Kurt said with a lift of his eyebrow that Blaine knew meant business, “I fully expect when we’re old and grey in that nursing home for you still to be wooing me.”

“It would be my pleasure,” Blaine told him, quite honestly. He didn’t know any other way to love, anyway.

Kurt’s smile was small, thrilled, and just for him. “Good.”

“But I’m not sure that they’ll let us keep chickens in the nursing home,” Blaine said, not even bothering to fight back his grin. It always made his heart flip to hear Kurt talk about their future together and all of his plans for it, like it was a given now - again - that they’d be by each other’s sides. Not that Blaine was taking it for granted, but it still felt amazing to hear it.

“I already told you I don’t want a chicken.”

“Who says you’re the one getting the chicken?” Blaine asked. “I mean, these pictures show older men giving them to younger ones, and _you’re_ the older one here.”

Kurt turned on him with a glare. “First of all, in a few years I’m not going to be so understanding about you pointing that out. I’m warning you now. Also, I’m not giving you a chicken.”

“Even if I wanted one?”

“You don’t want a chicken, Blaine,” Kurt insisted, though there was a hint of worry in his eyes. Blaine didn’t see why; it wasn’t like he’d done more than just a little research about the idea of keeping pigeons on the roof of the building. It was a dying New York tradition, after all.

“I don’t know. I think it’s kind of a sweet gift,” Blaine said with a shrug.

“A chicken,” Kurt said flatly.

“It’s a lot more useful than flowers. It’s the gift of breakfast every morning.”

Shaking his head, Kurt started to stroll along the case again, past a kylix with a naked woman and another with a man with a kind of amazingly well-drawn erection almost as big as he was. “Flowers smell better,” he said, his profile an example of classical perfection over the line of his broad shoulder.

“ _You_ smell better,” Blaine said, following him. Kurt always smelled nice, of aftershave and hair product and soap and skin, and when they added sweat and arousal to the mix it was even more wonderful.

“Are you turned on?” Kurt stopped and whispered with wide, surprised eyes. “Because I know that voice.”

“Um?” Blaine cleared his throat and swallowed. His pants were feeling a little snug, now that he thought about it.

Kurt glanced around, like he was worried the pottery would overhear. “I guess there are a lot of naked men in here.”

“And you,” Blaine said, hooking his finger in the fabric between two of the buttons of Kurt’s body-skimming jacket. “You know I’ve always liked you in this. I’ve been wanting to touch you all day, ever since you put it on.”

Kurt’s eyes lit up with pleasure and pride, but he extricated Blaine’s finger and said primly, “We’re in a museum. We’re supposed to be looking at art.”

“The art is nice, but I like you better.”

“Blaine,” Kurt said with a fond firmness Blaine knew all too well.

“It’s true,” Blaine said, taking a step in closer to him. He knew he was pushing Kurt’s preferred boundaries, but they were alone in the gallery, and surely Kurt was feeling it, too, that thrum of sexual awareness, that satisfaction at knowing that no matter what evil was spewed on cable television and talk radio they were far from the first men in history to love each other, that there had been so many that there were exhibitions in museums about them, respectful exhibitions, that gay men weren’t strange or weird but just a part of humanity like everyone else and had been for millennia...

Kurt looked around, his eyes darting to the door, and said quietly, “If you get us kicked out of this museum I will never forgive you.”

Blaine’s smile leapt out of him, and he reached out immediately, getting a hand on Kurt’s waist and pulling him into his arms. Kurt laughed but let him.

If it had been up to him and if it might not have gotten them in trouble, Blaine would have happily kissed him breathless, but he made sure to keep it just a soft, warm touch of their mouths, full of affection and only a tiny hint of the true warmth that was burning inside of him. It was still intoxicating, not just the kiss, not just Kurt, not just the way his lips moved so surely against his, but also this proof of the very real love that filled them both.

It was probably for the best that he had to keep things chaste, Blaine realized as he made himself pull away. He could follow through with his desire to get Kurt out of that jacket back at home, and they still had more of the museum to explore today. Maybe even the halls of arms and armor to see that broadsword again.

Kurt made a breathy, contented noise and draped his arms around Blaine’s shoulders, loose and easy in the way he only was with Blaine. “Are you ready to go home soon?”

Blaine smiled up into Kurt’s handsome face, taking in his bright eyes and only slightly rain-wilted hair as he slid his hands up his strong, slim back. Kurt’s fingers played a little at the nape of Blaine’s neck, sending shivers down his spine. Okay, it was definitely better if they skipped the armor until next time and went home instead. “Absolutely.”

Kurt smiled back at him as he stepped away and slipped gracefully out of his grasp. “I didn’t think you’d object,” he said, offering his hand again.

Blaine wasn’t sure he’d ever be used to how attractive Kurt was to him, how much he just loved being with him. He hoped he never would be. “I’d be crazy if I did.”

“Mmm,” Kurt said happily and swung their hands a little before tugging to start them walking. He glanced over at the cases they passed, but Blaine didn’t care about them anymore. He had something far better to look at.

“ _Ho pais kalos_ ,” Blaine leaned in and murmured in Kurt’s ear.

“I’m going to be sorry I read that to you, aren’t I,” Kurt replied with a laugh.

“Probably. But you still love me,” Blaine said, still smiling, because he was sure it was true.

“Yes, I do,” Kurt told him, leading him toward the door at the far side of the gallery. He looked over at Blaine, something warm and wonderful in his expression that Blaine never wanted him to lose, and leaned their shoulders together as they walked. “And you are beautiful, too.”

“Thank you,” Blaine said, his throat going tight. It was amazing how a little compliment or a tiny touch from Kurt could still warm him from the inside out. “Should we stop by the gift shop on the way out? Since you don’t want a chicken? I don’t want to fall behind on my wooing.”

Kurt’s expression was all affection as he opened the door for him. “You’re doing just fine.”

**Author's Note:**

> I am, as ever, spoiler-free. Please don't spoil me for anything coming ahead in Glee! Thank you! <3


End file.
